I'm a private poultry consultant and birding tour guide. Poultry consultant from getting an MS in poultry science, but deciding I prefer helping backyard flock owners instead of going into the poultry industry. And bird guide by having over 20 years experience as a birdwatcher, and just starting to charge money when folks asked me to take them birding. Eventually I got picked up by a bigger international birding tour company, and now I lead a lot of tours for them as well as doing my own private tours. Well I guess not NOW anymore since all my trips got canceled, but hopefully next year again.

Well that's just wonderful to hear! Though I don't think a 90 subscriber youtube channel quite has me at celebrity status yet haha. I'm glad you're enjoying the videos, it's this kind of positive feedback that gets me to keep making them.

Good luck on finding the Pyrrhuloxia. They do show up in the hill country semi regularly, so it's not out of the realm of possibility.

Also Pyrrhuloxia are much more contrasty than Northern Cardinals, they are grey and red vs the female/immature cardinal which is more goldeny/warm and red. The dark mask and crest tip tend to stand out more on the Pyrrhuloxia, which it kind of does in your photo. Not enough to tell for sure either way, but enough to keep an eye out for a better look in the future. For now, all I can certainly ID this one as is a Pixel-loxia.

Had to do this in Ecuador once. Car was slowly sliding off the road towards a ~50 foot deep ravine, so jumped out, tossed the mats under the wheels, and gunned it in reverse. Thankfully it worked, and the rental company didn't question all the mud under the mats.

I'll preface this by saying I normally travel with specific goals in mind. I'm a birdwatcher, and when I travel I plan my trips around finding specific birds, anywhere from a few specific species to several hundred on a trip. I research where I want to go and what I want to see, come up with a route that makes sense, then book all my hotels and set the plan before I depart. I like to set each day in a specific area to minimize back and forth travel, you get a lot less wasted time if you plan out a sensible route. I use google calendar to plan each day out, with approximate times at each location along with any significant travel times. I love having a calendar, because then there is no indecisiveness or time spent researching places to go during the trip, I spent all my time researching at home with access to much better resources. I can just trust in the plan that I created and optimized before I left, no debating with myself or finding excuses to be lazy during the trip. All I need to do is check my calendar the night before to see when I need to wake up and where I will be going, then just follow along. Obviously you can make changes as needed during the trip, but having that outline you can fall back on makes things much more relaxing and you get to spend more time doing things instead of face down in your phone trying to figure things out on the spot.

Canon 7DmkII, Tamron 150-600 lens, Shure VP83 mic, all mounted on a big carbon fiber tripod with a manfrotto fluid head. I've just been leaving it poking out my back window all day so I can hit record any time something interesting shows up.

That you don't need to follow the "reddit guide to travel". I prefer to plan each day out before the trip, get all my reservations in advance, rent a car instead of taking public transport, get out of any city as soon as possible, and stay in private rooms/hotels/ecolodges. It runs counter to most advice you see on here, but it's how I enjoy to travel most.

I also learned that driving in South America is like powerleveling your driving stats.

Nice shot! FYI though, that is a Sanderling. Black-bellied Plovers are larger, have a more upright stance, and a proportionally shorter and stouter bill. Usually Sanderling are always running around, so he really must have had something important on his mind! The other little peeps look like Semipalmated Sandpipers.